Stef's Blog - a native London Southlander and unrepentant 'Conspiraloon™' who doesn't trust anyone, not even himself. Sometimes I take pictures. I also enjoy swearing immensely and think much faster than I can type, so each post comes guaranteed to include at last one confusing typo. OK?

Monday, October 13, 2008

I love it when a plan comes together

There are a few stock phrases being bandied around by financial commentators which are starting to get to me, either because they're meaningless; offering no explanatory power whatsoever, or simply misleading

My favourite cliches of the moment include...

'The Credit Crunch'

Coined early on in the current crisis and now blandly and repeatedly used as the 'explanation' for everything that is being and will be inflicted on us

'Why have I lost my job?''The Credit Crunch'

'Why is my pension worth fuck all?''The Credit Crunch'

'Why did my life savings disappear?''The Credit Crunch'

etc etc

'Banks are hoarding cash'

Misleading because it gives the impression that great big piles of touchable, sniffable cash actually exist. I've even seen the words '...in their vaults' used a few times. For fuck's sake

Also perplexing because I've yet to hear anyone identify which of the banks actually are the ones hoarding all that cash in those, er, vaults

That would be kind of interesting to know, given that virtually all of the banks are actively pleading poverty and holding their hands out for trillions more. Solely for the Common Good, obviously

'x billion pounds was wiped off the value of shares today'

Misleading because it supports the impression that those shares were ever worth their inflated values

So, in theory, if one irrational idiot pays way over the odds for a share, or a Beanie Baby, everybody else holding the same share, or Beanie Baby, gets to kid themselves that they'll all fetch the same price

For a while anyway

and vice versa if one irrational idiot sells a share, or Beanie Baby, for way under the odds

In the clip, Keiser articulates a thought that quite a few Loons seem to share; that stock market prices are being manipulated to scare the crap out of people. To use fear and panic as a means of manufacturing their consent to hand over 'hoards of cash' to the banks

Chomsky just doesn't seem to get it

He even goes so far as to say that a market crash is harmful to Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson's interests

/ scratches chin

Hmmmm, is it really

Henry Paulson

And, in the same vein, I suppose George Bush appearing on US television every five minutes crying out 'Don't Panic!! Don't Panic!!' really is the sort of behaviour that's genuinely intended to positively discourage panic

the bank bailouts are is biggest daylight robbery crime in a long time.Taxpayers are to pay billions of pounds to stop the big banks failing,,so we have the absolutely insane situation that the "people" are to "buy" shares(through taxes) so that they may be able to continue putting their hard earned cash into those very same fucked up institutions!!!everyone who has an account with these wankers should close that account withdraw the cash and put it somewhere else.

The ECB, the Bank of England and the Swiss central bank will conduct dollar auctions with maturities of seven days, 28 days and 84 days at a fixed interest rate, the Washington-based Fed said on its Web site today. The Bank of Japan will consider introducing ``similar measures.''

Policy makers from the Group of Seven nations pledged at the weekend to take ``all necessary steps'' to stem a market panic after the MSCI World stock index plunged 20 percent last week. Central banks last week cut interest rates in tandem for the first time since 2001, the U.S. plans to buy $700 billion in distressed assets from banks and in Europe, the U.K. is leading a push to keep lenders afloat with taxpayers' money.

European central banks have opened the floodgates with promises of unlimited dollar funding in a coordinated action with the US Federal Reserve.

The European Central Bank, Bank of England and Swiss National Bank said they were ready to inject as much as needed into the markets for dollars funding covering periods of seven days, a month and 84 days.

Banks would “be able to borrow any amount they wish against the appropriate collateral in each jurisdiction,” the central banks said in a statement. In Tokyo, the Bank of Japan said it was considering a similar step.

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